Brazilian Academic Appeals to Fauci Against President Bolsonaro
By Hotspotnews
In a March 30, 2021, diary entry, Fauci noted a Zoom meeting with then-Brazilian Health Minister Marcelo Queiroga. He wrote that Brazil needed U.S. help amid a severe COVID crisis, described President Jair Bolsonaro as similar to Trump and harming the country with his approach, offered research collaboration and strategy discussion, and explained that U.S. policy prioritized vaccinating Americans before donating surplus doses (while noting Brazil would receive vaccines from Pfizer, AstraZeneca, and Johnson & Johnson later).
After that meeting, Fauci recorded receiving a message from Brazilian immunologist Dr. Jorge Kalil (a full professor of Clinical Immunology and Allergy at the University of São Paulo’s medical school, former director of the Butantan Institute, and someone who served on a U.S. government advisory group related to COVID vaccine safety trials). According to Fauci’s summary (which contains his usual typos):
“He asked me to please help them and hang in there with them since Bolsonaro is terrible and the Brazilian scientific community and Brazilian people hold me in high regard and need me to defend them.”
The request came amid Brazil’s severe COVID crisis. President Jair Bolsonaro, democratically elected in 2018, had resisted the most extreme lockdowns and prioritised keeping the economy open. For this he faced fierce opposition from much of the academic and public-health elite.
Kalil’s appeal is significant. Rather than working through Brazil’s own institutions, a leading USP professor turned to an American official for help against his country’s elected head of state. The language is political, not scientific. It reflects a broader pattern in which credentialed elites treated populist leaders who challenged maximalist pandemic orthodoxy as threats requiring external pressure.
Fauci’s diary shows no evidence that he acted on the request. The significance lies in the request itself: an academic seeking foreign “defence” against a president chosen by Brazilian voters. Expertise has value, but it does not override democratic legitimacy. When scientists treat elected leaders as so “terrible” that foreign intervention is warranted, they reveal a deep distrust of popular sovereignty. Bolsonaro was treated like the enemy. The proof is here for everyone to see. Maybe all the deaths could be avoided, if the right medication was administered as Bolsonaro said.
The world watches today, as the real criminal is being discovered. Bolsonaro was right all along